ON THE MARCH
Umboo, the big circus elephant, was unchained from the stake in the
circus tent to which he was made fast, and led out by one of the men.
"Oh, where are you going?" asked Horni, the rhinoceros, who had been
taking a little doze, and who woke up, just as the men came in. "I
thought I heard some one say you were going to tell a story, Umboo,"
spoke the rhinoceros.
"I was going to, and I started it," the elephant answered, "but now I
must go out and help push a wagon loose from where it is stuck in the
mud. I'll be back pretty soon, for it is no trouble at all for me to
push even a big circus wagon."
"Yes, you are very strong," said Chako, the monkey. "Well, don't
forget to come back and tell us about the jungle. That will make us
forget the heat."
"Come, Umboo!" called one of the men, as he loosed the heavy elephant
chains. "You must help us with the wagon."
Out of the circus tent walked the big elephant. He could understand
some of the things the circus men said to him, just as your dog can
understand you, when you call:
"Come here, Jack!" Then he runs to you, wagging his tail. But if you
say:
"Go on home, Jack!"
How his tail droops, and how sadly your dog looks at you, even though
you know it is best for him to go back, and not, perhaps, go to school
with you, like Mary's little lamb.
So, in much the same way, Umboo knew what the men wanted of him. He
was led across the circus lot, outside the big, white tent, that was
gay with many-colored flags, and as Umboo swayed along, some boys, who
were watching for what they might see, caught sight of the great
elephant.
"Hey, Jim! Here's one of the big ones!" shouted one boy.
"Maybe he's going to take a drink out of the canal," said another.
"Maybe they're going to give him a swim," spoke a third boy.
But the men had something else for Umboo to do just then. They led him
to where one of the big wagons, covered with red and gold paint, and
shiny with pieces of looking glass, was stuck fast in the mud on a
hill. For it had rained the day before the circus came to show in the
town, and the ground was soft.
"Now, Umboo!" called the circus man, who was really one of the
elephant keepers, and who gave them food and water, "now, Umboo, let
us see if you can get this wagon out of the mud, as you did once
before. The horses can not pull it, but you are stronger than many
horses."
The horses, with red plumes on their heads, were still hitched to the
wagon. There were eight of them, but they had pulled and pulled, and
still the wagon was stuck in the mud.
"Are you going to help us, Umboo?" asked one of the horses who knew
the elephant, for the circus animals can talk among themselves, just
as you boys and girls do. "Are you going to help us?"
"I am going to try," Umboo answered. "You look tired, horsies! Take a
little rest now, while I look and see which is the best way to push.
Then, when I blow through my nose like a trumpet horn, you pull and
I'll push, and we'll have the wagon out of the mud very soon!"
Umboo was led up to the back of the wagon. He looked at where the
wheels were sunk away down in the soft ground, and then, being the
strongest and most wise of all the beasts of the world, the elephant
put his big, broad head against the wagon.
"Now, then, horsies! Pull!" he cried, trumpeting through his trunk,
which was hollow like a hose. "Pull, horsies!"
The horses pulled and Umboo, the elephant, pushed, and soon the wagon
was out on firm, hard ground.
"That's good!" cried the circus man. "I knew Umboo could do it!"
Then he gave the elephant a sweet bun, which he had saved for him, and
back to the tent went Umboo.
"Now, please go on with your story!" begged Chako. "Tell us what
happened in the jungle."
"I will," said Umboo, and this is the story he told. Umboo was only
one of a number of baby elephants that lived with their fathers and
mothers in the deep, green jungles of India. Not like the other jungle
beasts were the elephants, for the big animals had no regular home.
They did not live in caves as did the lions and tigers, for no cave
was large enough for a herd of elephants.
And, except in the case of solitary, or lonely elephants, which are
often savage beasts, or "rogues," all elephants live in herds--a
number of them always keeping together, just like a herd of cows.
Another reason why elephants do not live in one place, like a lion's
cave, or in a nest or lair under the thick grass where a tiger brings
up her striped babies, is that elephants eat so much that they have to
keep moving from place to place to get more food.
They will eat all there is in one part of the jungle, and then travel
many miles to a new place, not coming back to the first one until
there are more green leaves, fresh grass, or new bark on the trees
which they have partly stripped.
So Umboo, the two-hundred-pound baby elephant, lived with his mother
in the jungle, drinking nothing but milk for the first six months, as
he had no teeth to chew even the most tender grass.
"Well, are you strong enough to walk along now?" Umboo's mother asked
him one day in the jungle, and this was when he was about half a week
old.
"Oh, yes, I can walk now," said the baby elephant, as he swayed to and
fro between his mother's front legs, while she stood over him to keep
the other big elephants, and some of the half-grown elephant boys and
girls, from bumping into him, and knocking him over. "I can walk all
right. But why do you ask me that?" Umboo wanted to know.
"Because the herd is going to march away," said Mrs. Stumptail, which
was the name of Umboo's mother. "They are going to march to another
part of the jungle, and your father and I will march with them, as we
do not want to be left behind. There is not much more left here to
eat. We have taken all the palm nuts and leaves from the trees. We
have only been waiting until you grew strong enough to march."
"Oh, I can march all right," said Umboo, telling his story to the
circus animals in the tent. "Look how fast I can go!"
Out he started from under his mother's body, striding across a grassy
place in the jungle. But Umboo was not as good at walking as he had
thought. Even though he weighed two hundred pounds his legs were not
very strong, and soon he began to totter.
"Look out!" cried his mother. "You are going to fall!" and she reached
out her trunk and wound it around Umboo, holding him up.
"Hello!" trumpeted Mr. Stumptail, coming up just then with a big green
branch in his trunk. "What's the matter here?"
"Umboo was just showing me how well he could walk," said his mother,
speaking elephant talk, of course. "I told him the herd would soon be
on the march, and that he must come along."
"But we won't go until he is strong enough," said Umboo's father.
"Here," he said to Mrs. Stumptail, "eat this branch of palm nuts. They
are good and sweet. Eat them while I go and see Old Tusker. I'll tell
him not to start to lead the herd to another part of the jungle until
Umboo is stronger."
Then, giving the mother elephant a branch of palm nuts, which food the
big jungle animals like best of all, Mr. Stumptail went to see Tusker,
the oldest and largest elephant of the jungle--he who always led the
herd on the march.
"My new little boy elephant is not quite strong enough to march, yet,"
said Mr. Stumptail to Tusker. "Can we wait here another day or two?"
"Oh, yes, of course, Mr. Stumptail," said the kind, old head elephant.
"You know the herd will never go faster than the mothers and baby
elephants can travel."
And this is true, as any old elephant hunter will tell you.
"Thank you," said Mr. Stumptail, to Tusker; for elephants are polite
to each other, even though, in the jungle, they sometimes may be a bit
rough toward lions and tigers, of whom they are afraid.
Back to the mother elephant and Baby Umboo went Mr. Stumptail, to tell
them there was no hurry about the herd marching away. And two or three
days later Umboo had grown stronger and was not so wobbly on his legs.
He could run about a little, and once he even tried to bump his head
against another elephant boy, quite older than he was.
"Here! You mustn't do that!" cried his mother. "What trick are you up
to now?"
"Well, this elephant laughed at your tail," said Umboo. "He said it
was a little short one, and not long like his mother's!"
"Don't mind that!" said Mrs. Stumptail, with a sort of laugh away down
in her trunk. "All our family have short, or stumpy tails. That is how
we get our name. The Stumptail elephants are very stylish, let me tell
you."
"Oh, then it's all right," said Umboo, who was called by that name
because he had made that sort of noise or sound through his nose, when
he was a day old. And elephants and jungle folk are named for the sort
of noises they make, or for something they do, or look like, just as
Indians are named.
So Umboo played in the deep jungle forest with the other little
elephant boys and girls until his mother and father saw that he was
strong enough to walk well by himself.
"Now we will start on a long march!" called Tusker one day. "The
jungle here is well eaten, and, besides, it is no longer safe for us
here. So we will march."
"Why isn't the jungle safe here any more?" asked Umboo of his mother.
"I'll tell you," answered Tusker, who heard what the little elephant
asked. "The other day," went on the big chap, "I went to the top of
the hill over there," and he pointed with his trunk. "I heard up there
a noise like thunder, but it was not thunder."
"What was it?" asked Umboo, who liked to listen to the talk of the old
herd-leader. The other little elephants also gathered around to
listen.
"It was the noise of the guns of the hunters," said Tusker. "They are
coming to our jungle, and where the hunters come is no place for us.
So we must march away and hide. Also there is not much food left here.
We must go to a new jungle-place."
Raising his trunk in the air Tusker gave a loud call. All the other
elephants gathered around him, and off he started, leading the way
through the green forest.
"Now if I go too fast for any of you baby elephants, just squeak and
I'll stop," said the big, kind elephant. "We will go only as fast as
you little chaps can walk."
"You are very kind," said Mrs. Stumptail, helping Umboo, with her
trunk, to get over a rough bit of ground.
On and on marched the elephants to find a new place in the jungle,
where they would be safe from the hunters, and where they could find
more sweet bark, leaves and palm nuts to eat. Umboo walked near his
mother, as the other small elephant boys and girls walked near their
mothers, and the bigger elephants helped the smaller and weaker ones
over the rough places.
Pretty soon, in the jungle, the herd of elephants came to what seemed
a big silver ribbon, shining in the sun. It sparkled like a looking
glass on a circus wagon, though, as yet, neither Umboo, nor any of the
other big animals had ever seen a show.
"What is that?" asked Umboo of his mother.
"That is a river of water," she answered. "It is water to drink and
wash in."
"Oh, I never could drink all that water," said the baby elephant.
"No one expects you to!" said his mother, with an elephant laugh. "But
we are going to swim across it to get on the other side."
"What is swimming?" asked Umboo.
"It means going in the water, and wiggling your legs so that you will
float across and not sink," said Mrs. Stumptail. "See, we are at the
jungle river now, and we will go across."
"Oh, but I'm afraid!" cried Umboo, holding back. "I don't want to go
in all that water."
Mrs. Stumptail reached out her trunk and caught her little boy around
the middle of his stomach.
"You must do as I tell you!" she said. "Up you go!" and she lifted him
high in the air.
"Oh, did she let you fall?" suddenly asked Chako, who, with the other
animals in the circus tent, was eagerly listening to the story Umboo
was telling. "Did she let you fall?"